Mark Your Calendars: The Prestigious WA Wine Weekend

Uniquely, more than 60 premium Washington wineries must be invited before they can pour at this prestigious event.

On July 7, as is tradition for 20 years, winemaker dinners with locally renowned chefs are held in top Seattle restaurants and private homes for $200-$350. The $850 per-person dinners in Walla Walla and Red Mountain include round-trip chartered jet from Seattle.

The fun continues on July 8, with a magnum tasting for serious wine lovers at Waterfront Seafood Grill and Vinolution 14 – wine under the stars at the SAM Olympic Sculpture Park. All activities are $350; Vinolution tickets only cost $65 ($75 with parking).

The main event, though, is an auction of extravagant wine-related packages, a sunset barbeque from Waterfront Seafood Grill, and music on the rooftop of the Bell Harbor Conference Center ($350 and up).

The Washington Wine Festival is a nonprofit, created to educate the world about the Washington state wine industry and to raise funds for charitable organizations. Last year, more than $850,000 was raised for Camp Korey, a free-of-charge, medically supervised camp for seriously ill children.

On the festival’s website, you can find more information about tickets, wineries, restaurants and chefs.

About Margot

Margot has been writing about wine since 1997 at KOIN-TV in Portland, Oregon; ten years later, she created this blog. Write for Wine focuses on the fine wines of Washington state, with occasional posts about other northwest wine regions (Oregon and B.C.), California, ANZ and Bordeaux. A former national journalist in Canada, Margot has been a Washington wine enthusiast since moving to Seattle in 1999. Her motto: “It’s wine o’clock somewhere.”